


Collared

by tiger_moran



Category: Sherlock Holmes & Related Fandoms, Sherlock Holmes (Downey films), Sherlock Holmes - Arthur Conan Doyle
Genre: Collars, D/s, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2012-10-14
Updated: 2012-10-14
Packaged: 2017-11-16 07:53:07
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 427
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/537203
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/tiger_moran/pseuds/tiger_moran
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Moriarty is the tiger-tamer; Moran is his collared tiger.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Collared

 The brass nameplate bears the name ‘J. Moriarty’, as if Moran could ever forget that the professor owns him.

   “Sebastian,” Moriarty says, and it’s only one word; only his name, but it’s a question and an instruction and a request and a demand, even, all in one.

   He submits, because it’s the professor asking him to, but when Moriarty buckles the collar around his throat he screws up his face in distaste, resenting the feel of the stiff leather pressing against his skin.

   “There,” Moriarty says, smiling down at him as he slips the loose end of the strap through its keeper, and there’s a sense of malicious glee in that smile. “A perfect fit.” His hands linger for a while close to Moran’s face, brushing his cheeks; cupping his jaw and lifting the sniper’s face so that his sullen gaze meets the professor’s. “Do you like it?”

   Moran grits his teeth; seems to be about to snap at the professor’s hand. “Yes sir,” he says sourly.

-

-

   One look – the tiniest of looks – is all it takes, and Moran is naked and on his knees and bowing his head slightly, allowing the professor to pass the smooth, supple leather around his neck. When Moriarty’s hand brushes his cheek after he finishes fastening the collar, Moran nuzzles against it, and presses kisses to the underside of the professor’s wrist.

-

-

   Moran never slept well with anyone else; he always preferred to sleep alone, until the professor made him his. Now though he’s always alone at nights, and he always sleeps badly, dreaming of the falls; of empty water; of screaming the professor’s name into nothingness and getting no response back. Sometimes the only way he can make it through the night is to drink and strip naked –  _almost_  naked, anyway – and curl up on his side in the centre of the bed, with his collar fastened around his throat. The pressure of the leather band at least gives him the vaguest illusion that he still has a master.

-

-

   He comes back, older, more scarred, limping slightly, but still fundamentally the same man. No longer officially a professor and no longer does he have control of a vast empire and direct influence over hundreds of men, but Moran calls him ‘Professor’ anyway; calls him ‘sir’ as he drops to his knees. It doesn’t matter to the colonel what’s been lost, only what has returned. Later, as he lets Moriarty slip the collar around his throat once more, Moran knows that this man is still and will always be  _his_  master.


End file.
